5 out 5 for Greiner but Leino shows promise for final

Having already wrapped up the overall TQ in the third round of qualifying at the German ENS, Dominic Greiner didn’t let up taking the remaining two qualifiers at Minidrom Ettlingen.  Completing the clean sweep, the Serpent driver is clearly the man to beat in tomorrow’s Main as he seek his first win at the Round 3 of the championship, but the biggest news of Q4 & 5 was the improvement made by Austrian ENS winner Teemu Leino.

Set to line-up third on the grid behind the two early dominant drivers of weekend Greiner and Dirk Wischnewski, a complete rebuild of his HB R10 for Q4 had Leino in contention for a TQ run.  Unfortunately catching a backmarker on his final lap the Finn would end up on the grass denying him a shot at ending Greiner’s reign.  In Q5, Leino would again swap times with the German the gap at the end half a second.  Also racing 1:8 this weekend, Leino said after Q3 together with his Japanese mechanic Takashi Miyashita they made the call to focus on the 1:10 car and able to fully rebuild the 1:10 car as a result he was immediately ‘back in the game’.  Saying the car ‘just need the extra attention’, the former World Championship Top Qualifier is feeling confident for the final.  Asked about strategy, he said he would do his calculations tonight in terms of tyres but in the engine department he was happy with his mileage adding that he wasn’t so sure his rivals were in the same positive position with run time.

Although joint leaders of the championship Jilles Groskamp and Bruno Coelho have just scraped into the Main and will line up 8th and 9th respectively behind reigning champion Eric Dankel.  Groskamp said he is ‘still struggling’.  Switching back to an SRS bodyshell the HB/Maxima team driver said his R10 is still not right with it feeling as if it gets stuck in the corners.  Feeling this is also effecting his engine with it lacking bottom end power, he said they have tried a lot of stuff but can’t find the problem.  Suffering from too tight a clutch in the final qualifier he said while he is not the only top driver having problems with the track’s unique asphalt, he said Leino is running the same car and has managed to get back on pace.  Hopefully he can find something in the A-Main practice session tomorrow, he said its going to be hard to fight for the win but the fact that he is in the final ‘you never know what can happen’.

Struggling with getting a set-up that lets him push the car without traction rolling, Bologna ENS winner Coelho said it been a ‘tough weekend’.  The Portuguese driver with such high grip they have struggled to get the NT1 to work especially on big tyres.  While the car was better in Q5, he said the final will be about ‘damage limitation’ in terms of the championship standings rather than challenging for the win. While admitting he is running out of time he hopes they can further improve the car for the 45-minute Main.  Highlighting his team’s struggles this weekend team-mate & reigning World Champion Alexander Hagberg has qualified 14th meaning he will have to hope he can finish in the Top 2 of the in the B Final in order to bump up and complete the 12-car A-Main starting grid.

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